…I want to travel everywhere.  My name is Holly Kiang, I was born in Manhattan, and raised in Forest Hills, Queens.  Both my parents are from Hong Kong, arriving when they were eight and sixteen.  Having arrived in the United States when they were young, my parents are quite Americanized, as am I.  Their siblings and parents have immigrated as well, making celebrations more traditional than I would have probably ever experienced.  My paternal grandmother recently became an American citizen and will speak English on occasion but reprimands me for not remembering more Chinese.

I am making an ad hoc major in Environmental Science, Economics, and Political Science and I hope to minor in International Business and Latin American and Caribbean Studies (along with the New York Studies minor).  I plan to attend graduate school, but I want to join the Peace Corps and see the world.  There are so many natural wonders to see and think about how humans interact with this natural world; I want to explore it as much as I can.

Having commuted to Manhattan for high school and various activities, I want to experience something different and new.  At heart I’ll always be a city girl because there’s always something to do and something unique and interesting to explore, but there are just some things the city can’t offer. My main goal for the future is to travel, and become a citizen of the world.

Greetings all! My name is Peky Huang and I am a Chinese-American. Something that I am always asked is whether or not my name has a meaning, and the answer is no. It has no meaning and its origins are unkown. My parents were immigrants from China. My mom’s side of the family is from Guangzhou and my dad’s side is Toisan.

I actually found it a bit difficult to find a picture of myself to put up. 1) I am not the type to take pictures of myself because I am always the one taking pictures of everything else around me. 2) My hairstyle and look has constantly changed over the past few years, so finding a picture that accurately portrays me was hard. I guess this one will have to do.

So a little bit about me. I am a native New Yorker and I have spent all my life living in Brooklyn. I went to Stuyvesant High School thinking I would be a bio major, but changed my mind when I took AP Bio. I then decided that going Business would be the most efficient way of making money, thus I ended up in Baruch. I have been deciding between Finance, Accounting and Marketing; one of those will be my major and another will be my minor. I have now chosen to be an Accounting major, but my minor is still unknown.

I am generally a very relaxed person who likes to make jokes and have fun. When I set my mind to something however, I can get quite serious. Things I like to do include eating, sleeping, watching movies, playing basketball, and playing video games. Though I haven’t danced in a while, I plan on picking it back up sometime in the future. Something else I like to do is travel; I want to someday fill up my passport with stamps and visas from many different countries. I hope to start by exploring the fifty states of the United States. This though, is not to say that I don’t like the city. To me, New York City is truly the best place on Earth and I love it.

Hi everyone! My name is Ru Xiao Chen and I was born in Fuzhou, China. I came to the U.S.A. seven years ago. Like Yang, Haesol, and Prof. de Graauw, I am not a U.S. citizen yet, holding a green card, which will expire in 2013. I either need to renew it (soon) or become a naturalized citizen. I am still deciding, which is why I am interested in the dual citizenship topic. Having influences from both Chinese and American cultures, I am planning to be an International Business major. After the fun explore of Arts in New York City last semester, I am looking forward to learn about Immigration in NYC.
Nice to meet you all!

Hello,  my name is Yang Lin.  I was born in the town of Chang Le in Fuzhou, China and I immigrated here with my mom when I was 4.  As of now, I am a “permanent resident”.  It took me a long time to get my green card, especially with the difficulty of understanding legal jargon and having to go through lawyers.  I have lived in the Lower East Side/Chinatown area for as long as I have been in the states.  Growing up, I realized the difficulty in making transitions and in balancing both the American and the Chinese culture.  My dad is a very, very traditional man; so needless to say, it has been hard for me being in the middle.  But, you know, when life gives you lemons…  I speak my native language of Fuzhounese, and I picked up Mandarin and Cantonese along the way.  In high school, I volunteered to teach old immigrants English because I know the hardships with learning a new language.

To the exciting stuff!  I am an avid photographer and volleyball player.  I am currently not on any teams, but you will see me playing every day when it gets warmer.  I also dabble in basketball, ultimate, football [I love to tackle], and handball.  Also, I love to travel. Hence the International Business major.  Company-sponsored trips here I come!

My name is Doris Hu and I am a freshman at the Macaulay Honors College at Baruch College. I hope to pursue a major in finance, but I am still very open to other fields.

I was born in America in 1992. However, my parents struggled taking care of me and my brother. They made the decision to have me be raised by my grandmother from my mother’s side. Since she lived in China, I migrated there when I was just a few months old. Later on, I moved back to the United States just in time for kindergarten. My home was at China. I knew no one here. Not even my family members. I had to battle the difficulty of learning a new language and the hardships of integration. Even though I was born here, I feel that I have had the experiences of an immigrant.